If ‘400 Blows’ were female and Iranian, it would be the sharply observed ‘Ava’

By G. Allen Johnson

Updated
1:53 pm PDT, Thursday, July 12, 2018

Mahour Jabbari plays the title role in “Ava,” the first feature film from Iranian director Sadaf Foroughi.

Mahour Jabbari plays the title role in “Ava,” the first feature film from Iranian director Sadaf Foroughi.

Photo: Grasshopper Film 2017

Photo: Grasshopper Film 2017

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Mahour Jabbari plays the title role in “Ava,” the first feature film from Iranian director Sadaf Foroughi.

Mahour Jabbari plays the title role in “Ava,” the first feature film from Iranian director Sadaf Foroughi.

Photo: Grasshopper Film 2017

If ‘400 Blows’ were female and Iranian, it would be the sharply observed ‘Ava’

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Ava is a 17-year-old high school student in Iran. When her mother tells her, “You can’t just play your own tune in life,” she is not just talking about her daughter’s desire to pursue the impractical career of violinist, but also about an entire societal structure designed to virtually imprison young women, be it in a strict school for girls or, eventually, marriage.

In watching “Ava,” a visually inviting and sharp portrait of teenage life in Iran, one must admire how writer-director Sadaf Foroughi was able to play her own tune in life. Born in Tehran but now based in Canada, she has made a career of exploring the struggles of Iranian women.

Her 2007 documentary “Féminin, masculin,” for example, was about Tehran’s first female bus driver — in a culture where women sit at the back of the bus. “Ava” is Foroughi’s feature debut and is based on her own adolescent experiences.

Ava (an excellent Mahour Jabbari) is a typical teenage girl, it would seem. She and her friends talk about boys, they swear, she likes volleyball and especially music.

Her home life is something less comfortable. Dad (Vahid Aghapour) is pretty cool, but his architecture and design work has him traveling a lot. Mom (Bahar Nouhian) is not so cool — so worried that her child will draw outside the lines that she has an ongoing campaign to gaslight Ava into thinking practically every normal human impulse is morally wrong.

At one point, she takes Ava for a gynecological exam to make sure she is still a virgin.

Ava, along with her classmates, is hounded by the school administrator, a Ms. Dehkoda (Leili Rashidi), who at one point, in relating a story about a student in the district who “brought a certain circumstance upon herself,” lectures the class, reminding them “you will be watched” and that “your mind is already polluted. … Anyone who succumbs to those animalistic desires will be punished.”

For a film that largely takes place in small rooms and interiors, Foroughi and cinematographer Sina Kermanizadeh’s compositions are lushly beautiful. Foroughi often frames her shots from doorways or even just outside the doorway, creating a feeling of Ava being constantly watched and examined for any slip-up.

Ava is a layered, complex character, and one that anyone who was ever a teenager can identify with. Her spiritual brother, cinematically speaking, is the Antoine Doinel of “The 400 Blows.” Adulthood might be the only way to escape, and it can’t come fast enough.